Leicester vs Everton Predictions, Betting Tips, and Preview

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Leicester vs Everton Betting Tips

Leicester City’s miraculous title haul will always be a highlight of Premier League folklore but now the reigning champions are desperate to avoid another fairy tale story that could see them relegating from top-flight football just an year after being crowned as kings of English football. The defending champions managed to accumulate only 17 points from as many games and still require 23 more points to avoid a push back to the Championship. Grasping at straws, Leicester need to maintain the resilience they showed in last week’s 10 men draw against Stoke to grind out a favorable result against Ronald Koeman’s Everton on Boxing Day.

Everton returned home empty-handed from their last four Premier League away fixtures. They also failed to arrest their 13 match winless streak against Merseyside rivals Liverpool last week, as they conceded a late goal at home to the All Reds. Everton enjoyed majority of the possession in the first half but failed to engineer a single shot on target. Liverpool also failed to test Maarten Stekelenburg in the first half, making it only the second Premier League game this season without an on target attempt in the first half. The loss against Liverpool sent Everton further down the pile to the 9th position with only two wins in their last 12 games.

TEAM NEWS

Everton

Maarten Stekelenburg had a collision with teammate Leighton Baines in last week’s Merseyside derby and failed to finish the game. James McCarthy was also subbed off early with a hamstring strain. McCaethy has been ruled out for a couple of months while Stekelenburg will be re-assessed on Sunday.

Jamie Vardy enters his three match suspension period after his appeal was turned down by the FA. Vardy was shown a straight red for his challenge on Stoke forward Mame Biram Diouf. Robert Huth and Christian Fuchs will also be suspended for picking up their fifth yellows of the season. Danny Drinkwater will face a fitness test before the game.

Suspensions: Jamie Vardy(3), Christian Fuchs(1), Robert Huth(1)

Doubtful: Daniel Drinkwater(knee)

PREDICTION

Leicester have a rather decent record at home this season-4 wins, 3 draws, 1 loss. But they will be missing some of their first time regulars which could be key factor in this game. We believe Everton will end their torrid run of away results on Boxing Day and pick up a win.

Leicester did the double over Everton last season on their way to the title, the first time they had done that since 1985/86. However, these are Everton’s only defeats to Leicester in 13 league games (W2 D9).

The Foxes haven’t won a Premier League Boxing Day match since beating Sheffield Wednesday 1-0 in 1998 (D1 L5).

Everton are unbeaten in their last four Premier League away games on Boxing Day, scoring exactly one goal in each match (W2 D2 L0).

Leicester City have won just 17 points from their 17 games this season – that’s less than half the tally they had at this stage in their title-winning 2015-16 campaign (38 points).

The Foxes have conceded a goal in each of their last 10 Premier League games – only bottom of the league side Hull are on a longer run without a clean sheet in the competition (15 games without one).

Everton have lost four successive Premier League away games – they haven’t lost five in a row on the road since January 2015.

Romelu Lukaku has scored six of Everton’s nine Premier League away goals this season (67%) and has also attempted 42% of their shots on target on the road (14/33).

Everton have lost just two of their last 13 Premier League games against a reigning champion (W6 D5 L2).

However, the only previous occasions that Everton have defeated the reigning Premier League champions away from home in the competition were in March 1996 versus Blackburn Rovers and December 2013 at Manchester United.